


i'm living on such sweet nothing

by owlvsdove



Series: soft shock [4]
Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Academy Era, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-19
Updated: 2014-10-19
Packaged: 2018-02-21 18:11:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,563
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2477648
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/owlvsdove/pseuds/owlvsdove
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“<i>Oh, Jemma, it’ll be so boring without you; I couldn’t possibly</i>—”</p>
<p>“Oh, shut up!”</p>
<p>“—<i>bear one minute alone facing people from my past!</i>”</p>
            </blockquote>





	i'm living on such sweet nothing

**Author's Note:**

> Please note that any university/science jargon I threw around here is just words I learned at my job. I have no idea if any of this is accurate. PhD what? Fellowship who?
> 
> You don't care, though. You're just here to see if they kiss again.

 

“Why are you here again?”

Jemma gives him a long, bland look over the rim of her glass. “Because you kept badgering me to come.”

“Right.”

“ _Oh, Jemma, it’ll be_ so _boring without you; I couldn’t possibly—_ ”

“Oh, shut up!”

“— _bear one minute alone facing people from my past!_ ”

“They’re not _people from my past_ ,” Fitz says, grumpy. “I told you, no one even knows me here. I came here, I got my doctorate, and I left. That’s all.”

She cocks her head at that. “So the real question is, why are _you_ here?”

“Because you kept badgering _me_ to come!”

“Fair point,” she concedes, taking a prim sip. He doesn’t want to smile, so he _doesn’t_. But he bets she can still sense it. She’s good like that.

They stand in silence for a moment. They’ve already sat through a day of back-patting and boring speeches (honestly, Jemma finds the whole university scene a bit pedestrian given she’s now a _SHIELD agent-in-training_ ) and now they’re at the mixer portion of the evening (which, to Fitz’s abject disappointment, looks _nothing_ like the school reunions of his 90s-era American television childhood) and frankly they’re a little bored. It’s true that Fitz didn’t really have friends here – getting a doctorate at age sixteen doesn’t really allow for much socializing; rather he spent most of his time drinking Redbull and building robots until he’d waited a “normal” amount of time to submit his dissertation – but Jemma had insisted he go because _you know, memories, posterity, showing off, other reasons_ (really, she probably just wanted to go to a party). In conjunction with the fact that he was interested in getting away from campus on their weekend break, he accepted her reasoning as coherent _enough_ and just acquiesced.

They'd been standing by the bar for some time now, mostly because he knew that would keep Jemma happy in case he got into an overly technical engineering conversation (as he was prone to do) with any of the people that had come up to him so far. Not that she couldn’t keep up, she just wouldn’t necessarily be inclined to. In fact, she’d been quite content to attach herself to his side all day, whispering her commentary in his ear, rather than winningly attempting to outshine everyone like she usually did. 

So far, no one that came up to them had monopolized her attention; she stood by his side, sometimes politely listening and sometimes shifting into the Jemma Simmons version of daydreaming, which involved working through a lot of chemical equations. He assumed.

But Fitz fills with a sense of dread as he wonders if that's about to change. Jonah Hastings. Is coming up. To them. God. _Damn_ it.

“Damn it,” Fitz mutters.

“What?”

“Bad, bad man. Very bad.”

The very bad man arrives.

“Fitz.”

“Hastings.”

He's got stupid flippy hair, and he flips it with that fucking head-jerk thing, the cool guy head-jerk thing.

“You haven't changed a bit. Aren't you still technically a child prodigy?”

Fitz goes blank with hatred. “No. Are you still using your wealth and status to get ahead in life?”

The guy grins, baring his teeth.

“Who's your friend?”

Of course he came over here for Jemma. Of course.

Jemma, for her part, seems to sense that something is off. “Jemma Simmons.” She extends a hand, making sure to look extra bored.

“ _You’re_ Jemma Simmons? I just read your latest paper in _Bioinformatics_.”

“I’m sure you did.” She’s being mean on purpose. Fitz loves it. It’s one of his favorite things that she does, besides, you know, everything else. But he loves this especially; some part of him delights in every moment she is disgustingly arrogant, especially in his defense. She uses her notoriety and intelligence as a shield, and it’s big enough for both of them, if he chooses to hide behind it. It’s quite kind, the way she wordlessly offers it.

He loves it.

“I thought it was brilliant,” Hastings continues. “I didn’t realize such a beautiful woman was behind the writing of it.”

“Ugh.” Her face contorts and everything. That’s not being mean, that’s just an honest reaction. Ugh. “I imagine being a graduate without a fellowship leaves you with a lot of free time; perhaps you should put it to use and do your research before you hit on people. I'm also a _child prodigy_.”

He gets her meaning and steps back a bit, tight and silent.

She grabs his hand quickly, pulling him away. “Come on, Fitz.”

They sit down at a big round table, empty except for them.

“You're eighteen,” he says first.

“So are you.”

“How'd you know he didn't have a fellowship?”

She shrugs. “Everyone's name tag has some accomplishment written under it, except for his.”

“Remarkable.” Her, he's referring to her.

She’s frowning.

“What?”

“I don’t like the way he was treating you.”

He shrugs. “I told you, I don’t have any friends here.”

She takes a drink. “He's _the guy_. The guy at the reunion you have to one-up.”

“It’s not really a reunion; it’s more of a graduate’s colloquium—”

“That’s irrelevant!” she says, a little too loudly. She might’ve drunk too much, he can’t tell. “He’s your nemesis.”

“Okay, fine. He’s my nemesis,” he appeases before finishing his drink, more relaxed now that they were relatively alone.

“And I don't like him either!”

“Okay.”

“I’m going to help you beat him.”

“How?”

She puts her glass down on the table and moves to sit down on his lap gently. One arm goes over his shoulder so her fingers can brush the spot on his neck where his hair ends; while the other hand tilts his chin towards her.

He just watches.

“He played his hand. He finds me attractive as a woman, but I rejected him. If I pretend to find you attractive, he will know he lost.” She explains it very seriously, as though it isn’t completely obvious.

“You _do_ find me attractive,” he points out.

“I found you attractive once. For _maybe_ an hour. Don’t extrapolate.”

He fights a smile at her haughtiness.

“He already knows he lost. You were pretty mean to him.”

“Less intelligent people sometimes need a lesson repeated.”

She's so close. He actually doesn’t feel so nervous. It’s not that he isn’t turned on by her; he’s just _always_ turned on by her. He lives in this state all the time.

She draws it out this time. She leans in atom by atom, waves of her hair swinging forward like shades being drawn, closing them into somewhere private, the space where they it is just her face and his face, her brain and his brain, and the oxygen that hasn't escaped yet.

The last few months have been trial after trial of the same experiment that was meant to end after one night. The results were conclusive, but she's going off the book. Or at least, off _his_ book. She’s moving with the unpredictability of a cunning animal and it’s terrifying. And interesting. And he's not going to start arguing now.

She is hard and soft and light and dark. And all good. It isn't gentle just because it's slow, no; the fervor is there but she's manipulating it. She's manipulating him. Holding tight to it, winding it up and around. He chases her lips, follows her tongue. It is dutiful, it is his pleasure.

She tastes like a good memory. She also tastes like an exhibitionist just getting her footing.

This is probably the most teenage thing they’ve ever done, considering they’ve both been in a hurry to get on with things since the outside world realized they were geniuses. An affair that’s inappropriate in several senses of the word.

Does SHIELD have an anti-frat policy? Does this even count?

Whatever. Doesn’t matter. She’s sighing into his mouth and that’s his very favorite thing. Relief he triggers in her. Like he’s actually having an impact.

Her hands are roaming. His are very firmly placed: one on her hip to steady her on his lap and one gripping his seat, the only part of him protesting this little plot. One of her hands tugs his hair a bit. Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck. If he doesn’t stop her now—

He pulls back.

“Did he see?” she asks immediately.

Oh god, who even cares. He pretends to look. “Mmhmm.”

“Good then.” Her mouth bunches.

She’s breathing hard. This has gone far past the realm of the reasonable. He gazes up at her.

“Is my lipstick smeared?”

He thumbs the edge of her lower lip deliberately, in concentration. “Now you're perfect.”

She rubs her lips together to make sure it's even.

“So that was—”

“You're welcome,” she cuts him off.

“I didn't _ask_ you to do that.”

“Don't be rude.”

He rolls his eyes at her.

They leave not long after that. People had clearly seen them, considering the looks they were getting as Fitz said goodbye to a few of his professors (mostly impressed, which Fitz took offense to), but no one mentions it.

The night air is cool and breezy and there’s no one around.

“Train?”

“Yeah. But I’ll probably fall asleep on top of you. You know—”

“Gin makes you sleepy. I know,” he finishes.

He keeps a good foot of distance between them as they walk to the station. A necessary precaution.

 


End file.
